Adventures in Alternative Medicine

The Fighter, Carrie Putrello, 34

Just after receiving the last of her chemotherapy treatments, dancer Carrie Putrello performed in public. Every cancer patient she knew "was nauseous or had weight problems," she says. "But I felt good." When Putrello, the owner of a dance studio in Utica, New York, was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, she went straight to the health-food store and started reading up on cancer and diet. She cut out sugar, white flour, and processed foods and drank only water and tea. "I don't even call it alternative [health]; it's just the way it should be."

A fighting attitude was vital to her recovery, as well. "I was mad. I thought, 'This is not going to happen—my kids are not going to grow up without a mother.' " While in the bathtub each evening, Putrello would visualize cancer cells seeping out of her body. She has now been in remission for a year. She sees an acupuncturist regularly and has maintained her diet. "But when my birthday came, I wanted chocolate so much—and I had it."

The Skeptic, Dan Marano, 33

In 1997, when doctors saw that his lymph glands were the size of tennis balls, Dan Marano was diagnosed with sarcoidosis, an autoimmune disorder. "There was no discussion of nutrition. Just a heavy regimen of steroids," Marano says of his surgeon's prescription. "I felt like a slab of meat on their cold table." He decided against steroids and consulted friends and books instead. While he had long mocked "new age" practices, he read Andrew Weil's Spontaneous Healing and decided that "the premise rang true." A meeting with a naturopath doctor who asked about his general symptoms led to a plan: Marano started breathing and cardiovascular exercises, took grape-seed extract, cyrillic acid and hoxsey—a combination of plant extracts—and eliminated wheat, dairy and sugars from his diet.

Three months later, the sarcoidosis was in remission, never to return. His doctors didn't attribute it to his regimen, figuring they caught the disease just before its remission. Marano, who lives in Ann Arbor, has since relaxed his dietary restrictions and hasn't completely sworn off Western medicine. "I advocate an integrated approach," he says.

The Dabbler, Amy Lynch, 34

Lynch wasn't exactly a natural health skeptic, but she certainly wouldn't have known one alternative remedy from another. Still, Lynch needed an energy boost for her stepped-up yoga and pilates workout. So she visited a natural-health store.

While browsing for standard Vitamin C, she happened upon multiple vitamins that contained 28 essential nutrients. The labeling boasted "high-strength vitamin-B complex and beta carotene." Lynch, who works at an advertising firm in New York City, gave it a try. She started taking the vitamins six months ago and noticed changes within a week. "I was much more energetic, and it enhanced everything—even hair and skin." The U.S. Food and Drug Administration can't evaluate the safety or effectiveness of supplements, but such high-power vitamins have made people like Lynch believers. Today, she's more amenable to alternative remedies: "Now, I use liquid echinacea when I feel a cold or flu coming on."

The Devotee, Dorothy Compeau, 50

In 1990, after weeks of suffering from tendonitis in her shoulder and no improvement with physical therapy, Dorothy Compeau visited a chiropractor. She was pain-free within a year. Compeau, a middle-school teacher in San Jose, California, continued the treatment for 10 years. "He was a homeopath. I felt like he was reading my mind, telling me things about myself I hadn't mentioned—but he was reading my body."

The chiropractor soon prescribed herbal remedies as he realigned her joints. "Some worked and some didn't," she says of his treatments for stress, allergies and other health concerns. "When he cured me of the shoulder ailment, he was my god… but over the 10 years, there were times when I thought I was throwing $75 a week at him, and we had both lost the focus." In 2000, Compeau switched to a massage therapist who also practices acupuncture.

The Nonbeliever, Josie Glausiusz, 39

"I had awful pain in my wrists, elbow, and neck," says Josie Glausiusz of the repetitive-strain injuries she sustained from typing a few years ago. "I tried physical therapy and it only made it worse." A new physical therapist practiced an alternative treatment called myofascial release—a stretching of the underlying muscle and thin tissue that covers the body's organs—and convinced Glausiusz to try it. "I would lie down and she would place her hands on my chest and stomach and press lightly. After the first time, I said, 'Oh, my goodness, the pain went away!' "

But after three months, even though the treatment soothed her, it didn't stop the pain. Glausiusz finally improved after she worked with a new physical therapist and gave up typing for six months—not an easy sacrifice in her job as an editor in New York. "It took patience for the pain to go away."

The Success Story, Soliman Eid, 17

Eid is a competitive swimmer who practically lives underwater. "I hope to go to the University of California at Irvine on a swimming scholarship," the high school senior says. But when his allergies and asthma strike, "I can't really breathe. I have about a quarter of the breathing capacity of the other swimmers."

When Soliman's allergies surfaced six years ago, his mother, Sophia, gave him antihistamines. "But he would get very irritable," she says. She went to a large health-food store in Irvine and found Sinus-Ease, a homeopathic remedy. Soliman has been taking it daily ever since.

"It's unbelievable," Soliman says. "It makes me more awake and my sinus and throat clear." Sophia gives Soliman zinc and echinacea when he's sick and another daily supplement called Mind Care, which contains fish oil (such oils have been shown to help concentration). A good thing because "he hates fish," according to Mom.

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